


50 First Dates

by theoncomingwolf



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, F/F, buncha different stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-19
Updated: 2016-05-31
Packaged: 2018-05-27 17:21:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6293155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theoncomingwolf/pseuds/theoncomingwolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I want Mariza to have a million unrelated ficlets of them beginning to date, like all the non-femslash ships get. If I have to write them all myself, so be it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pets

**Author's Note:**

> From my long list of AUs, Maria/Riza as neighbors- Maria has two cats in her apartment that are not allowed to live there; Riza can help.
> 
> Based off a prompt from here: http://perfectlyrose.tumblr.com/post/121916282111/apartment-aus

“Shit.”

Maria scooped up her black cat anxiously, pacing around with the limp, angry creature in her arms. It was a testament to how much the creature liked her that it did not start clawing her to bits for her needless decision to carry it.

She set the cat down, coming to the only conclusion that she could for her problem.

The landlord was going to be at her door any minute, and her 2 cats were 2 more cats than she was actually allowed to have at this no pets apartment complex. It had come to her attention, however, that her neighbor- the very attractive neighbor with the nice body and pretty face that Maria had been too afraid to speak to- had a dog, despite the rules. It was worth the risk, Maria reasoned, to run over and plead for the woman to take her cats for an hour while she sorted everything out with the landlord.

Making up her mind, Maria quickly slipped out the front door, hammering frantically on her neighbor’s, with a nervous glance towards the elevator.

The door swung open after a moment- her neighbor did not put on a friendly face, but she didn’t look too displeased at Maria’s loud knocking, eyebrows raised in anticipation for what she had to say.

“Hey!” Maria greeted, moving quickly through the formalities, “I’m your neighbor- I’ve seen you around, and that you had a dog, and I actually have, uhm, _two cats;_ I was wondering if you would mind terribly watching them for an hour or less? Please? The landlord is coming over...”

The blonde took all this information in, expression unchanged as Maria rattled off the details.

“He’s my service dog,” she says, after Maria has stopped.

Maria is not sure how to respond to that, but what she comes up with is probably not the best thing to say.

“For?”

The woman’s expression changes, finally, eyebrows falling and coming together.

Maria thinks she looks a bit angry, but before she has a chance to backpedal, the woman shrugs.

“I’ll take your cats.”

“Oh! _Thank you,”_ Maria coos, clapping her hands together and turning quickly towards her own door.

The elevator doors remain shut, but she moves quickly, fearing it will not be that way for long.

“ _Stay,_ Hayate,” the blonde says, following after Maria.

Maria scoops her angrier cat up, hoping to God that she won’t try and claw her to bits for it with Maria's savior watching.

The blonde picks up the other, pressing her lips into its soft fur as she walks back into her apartment.

Her neighbor’s apartment is the same as Maria’s, other than the furnishings. It’s less cluttered- neat, if not for the cardboard boxes stacked into the corners.

Maria sets her cat down, glancing nervously towards the dog, who sits at the blonde’s command.

“Are you moving?” Maria asks, inching towards the door.

“Ah, no,” she says, “I’ve... not quite moved in yet.”

Maria’s sure it’s been at least 3 months since the man residing next door previously had left and the blonde had moved in, but she shrugs, throwing in one last, fully genuine thank you before slipping out the door and into her own apartment.

The landlord doesn’t arrive for another few minutes, blearily clutching a coffee at 11:45 am, muttering something about pipes while he steps into Maria’s kitchen.

He sets the mug down on her counter, cracking open the cabinet to check below her sink.

“I haven’t had any trouble,” Maria repeats, just as she did before he’d called her.

“The old guy below you tried to fix his pipes on his own,” the landlord growls, “I just need to check yours to see what problem might have been so bad as to make him think he needed to do that.”

Maria leans against her table, biting her lip as she glances around.

“It uh, wouldn’t affect anyone around me, would it?” She asks, hoping he isn’t planning to knock on her neighbor’s door next.

Spying a toy mouse, Maria inches out of the landlord’s sight, bending quickly to pick it up and stuff it into her jacket pocket.

“No, it shouldn’t be necessary at anyone else; you're the one above his,” he sighs, closing her cabinet, “let me check the bathroom, then I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Sure,” she says, following him awkwardly to the doorway, where he repeats the process with the pipes beneath her bathroom sink.

Maria sits at her table when he finally leaves, opting to give it a few minutes before heading back over to collect her cats, so that she’s sure he’s really gone. She checks the hallway, shutting her door lightly behind her and knocking once more on her neighbor’s door.

“All well?” The woman asks, voice smooth and low.

“Yep,” Maria grins, widening her stance a little to deflect the excited pup who has come to greet her; her own cats don’t seem to even notice that she’s back, “thank you, so, so much. Uhm, I don’t think I caught your name, sorry.”

“Riza Hawkeye,” the blonde tells her, turning to grab her kettle, “would you like any tea, while you’re here?”

“I- sure, yeah,” Maria says, “but if you need me out of your hair, you’ve already been so great.”

“It’s fine,” Riza says, putting her kettle under the tap, “I understand how important pets can be.”

“Well, my cats serve no specific purpose- I just didn’t want to give them up when I moved in,” Maria admits, sitting at the table and setting a placating hand on Hayate’s head.

“That’s a good reason,” Riza says, “I like cats, anyway, it’s nice to see them.”

“Well, you can come to see them any time,” Maria offers, “and if you ever need a hand with your dog, I’m happy to watch him.”

The kettle hisses, on its way to a shriek; Riza moves to her tippie-toes to grab a couple of mugs for the tea.

“Sounds like a deal,” Riza says, sending a smile in Maria’s direction, who finds herself glad to be sitting.

Maria doesn’t really like dogs, but if that’s what it takes to spend more time around this woman, by God she can learn to.


	2. Four Alarm Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the prompt: "It’s 3am, in the dead of winter, some motherfucker pulled/set off the fire alarm and I am being very vocal about how I’m gonna make that fucker pay"
> 
> I didn't make up the prompt, but this happened at my apartment this year. :/
> 
> This one isn't too shippy, but it's interaction. Maybe the next will have actual smooches or smth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed the formatting of this fic a bit- at first I was planning to post a bunch separately, but now I think I'll just throw each of my unrelated Mariza one-shots here.   
> Most will probably be AUs, some will be them already dating, some, like this chapter, will be them interacting under canon-complaint settings.

Some people can sleep through anything; they miss work despite alarms, they don’t notice thunderstorms, they can fall asleep with the radio on and not even realize.

Riza is not one of these people. Having a dog has helped her to stay asleep at night, chasing away nightmares and assuring her that a thud at midnight cannot be too bad if Hayate doesn’t notice. 

Unfortunately, due to those deep sleeping fuckers, fire alarms are designed to be very difficult to ignore. The shrill scream of the bells throughout the building jolt Riza into a panicked awakening, which only worsens with Hayate’s frantic yelp and subsequent howling.

She finds herself standing with a gun in her hand, pointed safely towards the ground, before she is even really aware of what’s happening. 

Taking a rattled breath, Riza replaces her gun in its spot behind her bed, checking that the safety is still on before moving to the closet to pull on a winter coat and some boots. She checks the clock. Two AM. 

She grabs Hayate somewhat roughly by the collar to jolt him out of his howling, scooping the worried dog into her arms and planting a reassuring kiss onto his head. 

He’s an armful, but there’s no way she’s going to have him walk down the five flights of stairs; that many tired people going down at once, he’d get stepped on. 

Instead, she clutches the 20 pound pup to her chest as she heads into the stairwell. Instinct kicking in, Riza finds herself scanning the hallways, listening for sounds of distress, watching the people around her- for duress, for danger. Eventually, stairway after stairway ends in a door leading outside, into the frigid winter night. 

People from all over the apartment building are huddled outside, at what has apparently been deemed a safe distance away, but what Riza thinks is still rather close. 

Some are sitting groggily on the cold ground, seemingly unmindful of all the warmth being sucked out of their ass. Most stand, clutching their arms around themselves, head down, to preserve warmth. Some children are running around, chattering as if this is all a fun game, debating how bad it would be if the whole thing when down in smoke. One girl would lose all her books, but, the boy counters, it would look really cool. 

Riza crouches in front of the girl, who had reached a hand out to touch Hayate’s tail. She pets the dog’s head excitedly, and Riza finds herself thankful for Hayate’s patience with both of them. Maybe he’s just glad enough for the warmth that he doesn’t mind being held. Riza’s pretty glad for his warmth herself. She almost asks the kids cooing over her dog if they’re cold, but thinks better of it; kids don’t think too hard about a lot of stuff until you point it out to them.

“I don’t think the apartment building will burn down,” Riza assures them, softly, “I haven’t seen any smoke, so if there’s a fire, it’s probably not very big, and the firefighters will stop it.”

“Awh,” the boy groans.

Riza’s seen fires. She really hopes to not see another. 

She sits on the ground, letting the concrete suck all the warmth out of her ass, and clutches Hayate to her chest as the girl continues to play with him, holding one hand to his snout to see if he will lick it. He turns his head away, but her hand follows, pressed lightly to his wet nose and furry lips.

Riza scans the crowd, looking for anyone who seems anxious. Her gaze eventually settles on one fuming woman, but she’s not too worried that they’re the culprit. Maria Ross doesn’t seem like much of an arsonist, or irresponsible enough to set the alarm off on accident. 

She recognizes the fellow soldier instantly, despite her being out of uniform. Her short black hair is ruffled, a good match for her current attitude. She doesn’t seem to be handling the cold well.

Riza wasn’t aware that she and Ross shared a building, but she had only just come back to town after her stay in Xing.

Her main impression of the woman was positive, she supposed. She seemed rather friendly, and was often smiling and laughing, with Brosh or the Elrics. Despite this, her angry side doesn’t really surprise Riza too much. She pretty much just acts how she feels, and right now, she would say Ross seems to feel rather angry that she’s stuck outside in the cold instead of sleeping before an early morning shift. 

Riza opts not to call attention to herself. She’s rather tired, and cold, and doesn’t much feel like expending the effort to socialize at this time. It tends to take a lot out of her, and she’s not got a lot in her at this time. 

Instead, she sits, holding her dog. Her butt feels frozen, and wet, though she knows it’s just an illusion caused by the chill. The children leave her, huddling with their parents, and Riza glances once again towards the building for familiar signs of fire. She sees none, even after the firefighters have arrived and gone in to check. 

When they do come out, it’s with a soldier, who was no doubt on call nearby and sent to help. She can’t see his shoulders, but she thinks she recognizes him as a private. 

“Hey Lieutenant Ross,” he greets, oblivious of the other fellow officer in his presence. 

“Hey,” she grumbles, offering a tired smile to the young man.

“Uh, so folks,” he says, raising his voice to catch everyone’s attention, “these nice fireman went through building and found no risk of fire, but we’ll need to see whoever lives in room 413 before you’re allowed to go back in.”

Ross, the only person Riza finds herself interested in at the moment, is being somewhat of a bad example. She lets out a long huff and annoyance at the fact that she had to come out in the cold, in the middle of the night, and there wasn’t even a good reason like all of her stuff burning to a crisp. 

Riza takes another look around, her trained eyes landing on a couple of young men whispering nervously to one another. A third leans in to hear them, and laughs, clapping the other two on the backs. She’s pretty sure she’s found their culprits. Now they just have to step up, so she can go back in. 

The chatter has started back up, as the private waits patiently and Ross waits impatiently. One of the boys glances nervously towards Ross and the private again, keeping his head down. It’s definitely him.

“Well?” Ross says, “Who lives in 413?” 

She’s greeted by more chatter, but none is particularly informative, and none is directed at her. Everyone seems to be talking among themselves, and no one seems quite able to recall who are the occupants of room 413. 

Riza gently slides Hayate off her lap, stepping up and slipping into the crowd to place herself next to the boys. 

“Shh!”

The most nervous looking of the trio glares at his friend, “I can’t tell him that’s our room! We could get arrested.”

“You could,” his roommate defends, “I’m not the one who was messing with the alarm.”

“The fuck were you messing with the alarm at two in the morning, man?”

“I wanted to smoke, you know?” he presses his index finger and thumb together, like he’s holding a joint, “I didn’t want the alarm to go off.”

“That won’t set the alarm off!”

“Are you sure?”

“Well, no...”

Riza sighs, ready to grab the kid by the collar of his shirt and haul him over, when Ross deems the silence to have lasted too long.

“WHO LIVES IN 413? I HAVE TO WAKE UP IN 2 FUCKING HOURS IT’S 3 IN THE FUCKING MORNING TURN YOURSELVES IN, OR THIS CAN GET WORSE FOR YOU.”

Her yell manages to make it’s way over the loud murmur of the crowd, and one of the young men beside Riza hoots with laughter. The private looks pretty amused, himself. 

“I left the pot on the table!” the young man whispers, “I can’t tell them I live there!”

Ross has now positioned herself next to the private. She’s not very tall, and her hair’s a mess, and she’s wearing bright blue pajamas, but... we’ll there’s not much but involved. She looks pretty pissed, and she’s pretty good with a gun, but she’s not going to be doing any shooting, and she’s not unprofessional enough to hurt anyone, so she isn’t really a threat. The poor thing’s just tired.

“Ross.” Riza barks, raising her voice to be heard over the crowd. 

Maria’s eyes widen in surprise, and she cringes in what Riza thinks is embarrassment. 

Riza grabs the boy by the collar before he can careen through the crowd like a startled cat.

“This is your guy,”

“No!” he protests, turning to his friends for defense, “I live in- in 530.”

Ignoring him, Riza steps through the parting crowd, arm held above her head to grip the tall boy’s shirt.

"I live in 530!" an old woman corrects, to her left. 

“Oh,” the private says, finally recognizing the tiny, fierce woman standing before him, “hello Major Hawkeye. Thanks.” 

Hayate settles himself at her feet, shaking a little in the cold.

“You can return, but we’ll do top floors first, starting with ten,” the firefighter announces, eliciting a groan from those on lower floors.

“Except you two,” the private whispers, “you can head up to your floors now. Have a nice night; Major, Lieutenant.”

He clicks his heels together, sending a sharp salute to the two groggy women before him, clothed in their pajamas.

Riza salutes back, bending to pick Hayate up, but Maria opts for patting him on the shoulder, falling in line with Riza as she follows behind the crowd heading through the doors.

“What floor are you on?” Maria asks.

“Five,” Riza says, adjusting her grip on the pup in her arms, “you?”

“Nine,” she whines.

Riza laughs, which gets her a smile from the tired lieutenant climbing the steps beside her.

“No wonder you’re cranky,” she teases.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I empathize with Maria. The kids in my building also flooded the whole fourth floor, because the sprinklers went off. Fortunately I was on the seventh. 
> 
> Thanks for reading! Comments are wonderful, if you have a moment. And if you have a prompt, no promises, but I may fill it.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you have time to leave a review, they make my whole day. Also, proof that people actually read/like these are great encouragement to write more.


End file.
